Day: July 23, 2015

Review: Open Road Summer by Emery Lord

Posted July 23, 2015 by Rowena in Reviews | 2 Comments

Review: Open Road Summer by Emery LordReviewer: Rowena
Open Road Summer by Emery Lord
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Publication Date: April 15th 2014
Genres: Young Adult
Add It: Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Ripped Bodice | Google Play Books
two-half-stars

After breaking up with her bad-news boyfriend, Reagan O'Neill is ready to leave her rebellious ways behind. . . and her best friend, country superstar Lilah Montgomery, is nursing a broken heart of her own. Fortunately, Lilah's 24-city tour is about to kick off, offering a perfect opportunity for a girls-only summer of break-up ballads and healing hearts. But when Matt Finch joins the tour as its opening act, his boy-next-door charm proves difficult for Reagan to resist, despite her vow to live a drama-free existence. This summer, Reagan and Lilah will navigate the ups and downs of fame and friendship as they come to see that giving your heart to the right person is always a risk worth taking. A fresh new voice in contemporary romance, Emery Lord's gorgeous writing hits all the right notes.

I’ve been hearing great things about Emery Lord’s writing so I’ve been wanting to try her books out for a while now. I got to dig right into this book after I caught up on all of my review books for the month so I was pretty stoked.

This book follows Reagan as she spends the summer with her country superstar best friend Lilah Montgomery on the road for her summer tour. The summer was meant to be a best friends summer because Reagan was making some changes in her life and spending time with Dee, going from city to city was supposed to help her move on from the past she so desperately wants to leave behind. When Matt Finch joins the tour and starts hanging out with them, Reagan didn’t plan on liking him. She didn’t want to like him because he’s supposed to be playing the role of Dee’s boyfriend for the media (even though they’re not together) and she’s not the kind of person that will bring trouble to her best friend. But like Selena Gomez said, the heart wants what it wa-a-a-a-ants. And Reagan and Matt want each other.

I’m not exactly sure what I was expecting but I wasn’t expecting it to be so hard to like Reagan. Holy cow did she get on my nerves for a whole chunk of this book. I get that she’s been burned and treated badly but it was disappointing to see someone who was slut-shamed by others, slut-shame and judge the hell out of girls who approached Matt. Umm, you hated when those girls judged and shamed you at school so why would you do the same to random, means nothing to Matt girls? Reagan was very immature and her personality got on my nerves. I did like that she was super loyal to Dee (aka Lilah Montomery to the masses) but that loyalty didn’t really help with everything else that bothered me about her. Her snap judgments and her stubbornness got on my nerves and that stubbornness was still present at the end of the book, which was frustrating.

Matt was a good love interest. He was cute and swoony and everything that a pop star should be but I didn’t understand his attraction to Reagan. She was so mean and cold to him, not to mention how hot and cold she ran. One minute she was all swoony and all over him and the next, she’s pretending he doesn’t exist and ugh. When they finally do get together, I liked that all of the games Reagan played seemed to fall away.

The story progressed at a nice and steady pace and even though I was frustrated with Reagan, I wasn’t ever bored with the story. I liked getting a behind the scenes look at life on the road for a big summer tour. I liked seeing everything that went into being Lilah Montgomery and to be honest, I really liked and probably would have preferred reading about Dee and Jimmy. Their story was interesting, the big superstar and the guy she left behind…still in love but can’t be together…what happens? When they get back to Nashville and Dee goes to see Jimmy? That hug? Happy sigh. It was good stuff.

Anyway, the book as a whole had a lot that kept me interested but Reagan got on my nerves so I stayed frustrated throughout the entire reading. The whole bit with Matt’s best friend and Reagan, I wasn’t a fan of that. It felt forced and so obvious. I would have liked for something else to be the road block in their friendship and not something so contrived as that. But overall, I’m not mad that I read this book. I will probably read more from this author, I’ve already bought her other book so I’m sure I’ll get to it eventually.

Grade: 2.5 out of 5

This book is available from Walker. You can purchase it here or here in e-format.

two-half-stars


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My Book Challenge So Far…

Posted July 23, 2015 by Rowena in Miscellaneous | 6 Comments

In the beginning of the year (or maybe it was the ending of last year), Holly and I set some reading goals and this book challenge was one of them. I haven’t been paying any attention to what I’m supposed to be reading for this challenge so I thought I’d write up a post and find out.

2015 reading challenge

Here goes nothing…

1) A Book you own but haven’t read | The Fill-In Boyfriend by Kasie West
2) A Book that was made into a movie | The DUFF by Kody Keplinger
3) A Book you picked solely because of the cover | Chaos by Jamie Shaw
4) A Book your friend loves | Sincerely, Carter by Whitney Gracia Williams
5) A Book published this year | Trade Me by Courtney Milan
6) A Book by an author you’ve never read before | Me Before You by Jojo Moyes
7) A Book by an author you love | Suddenly One Summer by Julie James
8) A Book at the bottom of your “to be read” pile | Mine to Possess by Nalini Singh
9) A Book with a color in the title | The Duke and the Lady in Red by Lorraine Heath
10) A Book set somewhere you’ve always wanted to visit | Hard Rock by Nalini Singh (New Zealand)
11) A Book you started but never finished | Visions of Heat by Nalini Singh (started it last year but never finished it so I picked it up again this year and not only did I finish it, I loved it too!)
12) A Book with a lion, a witch, or a wardrobe | Dragon Bound by Thea Harrison
13) A Book with a female heroine | Midnight Pursuits by Elle Kennedy (Juliet set out to avenge her brother and protect some innocents, she was definitely a heroine)
14) A Book set in the summer | Open Road Summer by Emery Lord
15) A Book of poems | I’m low key curious to see if I’ll ever do this. I don’t really have an interest in reading a book of poems, not even for this challenge. Ha!
16) A Book you learned about because of this challenge
17) A Book that will make you smarter
18) A Book with a blue cover | We Can Work it Out by Elizabeth Eulberg
19) A Book you were supposed to read in school, but didn’t
20) A Book “EVERYONE” but you has read | Caressed by Ice by Nalini Singh
21) A Book with a great first line
22) A Book with pictures
23) A Book from the library | I’m probably not going to do this one either since I don’t have a library card. I have issues with returning books so I gave this one up a long time ago.
24) A Book you loved….read it again | Before Jamaica Lane by Samantha Young and Frigid by J. Lynn (I read both books this year just because I felt like it. Ames was reading the Samantha Young book for the first time and enjoying the heck out of it so I thought, why not? I read it too. I loved it all over again and Frigid, I read on a whim. A whim that ended with me quite satisfied with Kyler and Sydney’s story yet again)
25) A Book that is more than 10 years old
26) A Book based on a true story

Hmmm, not nearly as bad as I thought. I thought that I wouldn’t have read anything but as you can see, I have. I’ve completed 17 of the challenges and only have 9 challenges to finish before I’m completely done. I still have 5 months to finish too.

Go me!

Are you participating in this challenge? How are things looking for you? Do you have a lot of work to do or are you on track..like me?


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Guest Review: Sweet as Sin by J.T. Geissinger

Posted July 23, 2015 by Tracy in Reviews | 1 Comment

Guest Review: Sweet as Sin by J.T. GeissingerReviewer: Tracy
Sweet As SinPublisher: Amazon Publishing
Publication Date: July 14th 2015
Genres: Contemporary Romance
Add It: Goodreads
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | The Ripped Bodice | Google Play Books
two-stars

Twenty-something Kat Reid is loving life as an in-demand Hollywood makeup artist. She has absolutely no interest in rock 'n' roll, but in order to pay the mortgage, she agrees to work on the set of a rock video for the world-famous rockers known as Bad Habit...which brings her face-to-face with Nico Nyx, lead singer of Bad Habit and Adonis in the flesh.
However, the fiercely independent Kat isn't impressed by the hard-living, womanizing rock star. But when Nico's model girlfriend shows up to the set drunk and Kat is tapped to replace her as the video's sexy bride, her combustible chemistry with Nico suddenly threatens to consume the set. Nico feels it, too--and becomes determined to win Kat over, body and soul. Yet behind his rock god swagger, Nico hides a dark secret. Can he rock Kat's world forever, or will he just break her heart?

Tracy’s review of Sweet as Sin (Bad Habit #1) by J.T. Geissinger

Kat is earning a living by doing makeup when she meets rock star Nico. He is immediately smitten with her and starts contacting her via text and cell phone and practically stalking her. Kat isn’t impressed with the man who she thinks is hitting on her while the woman she believes is his girlfriend is in rehab. Nico assures Kat that Avery Kane isn’t his girlfriend and continues his pursuit of Kat.

Kat eventually gives in and it seems that almost immediately she falls in love with Nico. There are many secrets in Nico’s life, however and Kat’s not sure she can handle being left in the dark. She also has a serious problem with Nico’s brother, Michael, who is a pretty scary guy. Can their love survive all the drama in their lives?

This book was filled with angst and drama and when I thought it would finally die down I got more angst and drama. My God it was nonstop and a bit frustrating.

Kat wasn’t a bad character but she gave in to Nico so freaking easily and I thought she lost more than a small part of herself by doing so. She had a good life and he came in and blew it all to hell.

Nico’s issues were monumental. That man was so screwed up I honestly couldn’t believe that the author had such a hero in her story. He was possessive and not in a good comforting, protective way but in an asshole I-want-to-know-what-you’re-doing-at-all-times way. Creepy.

This book got 1 extra star because despite my issues with the book the author did get me to read the whole thing.

Rating: 2 out of 5

This title is available from Montlake Romance. You can buy it here in e-format. This book was provided by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

two-stars


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